Competition

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Competition is rooted in comparison. When you look at the world, you are instinctively aware of other people's performance. Their performance is the ultimate yardstick. No matter how hard you tried, no matter how worthy your intentions, if you reached your goal but did not outperform your peers, the achievement feels hollow. Like all competitors, you need other people. You need to compare. If you can compare, you can compete, and if you can compete, you can win. And when you win, there is no feeling quite like it. You like measurement because it facilitates comparisons. You like other competitors because they invigorate you. You like contests because they must produce a winner. You particularly like contests where you know you have the inside track to be the winner. Although you are gracious to your fellow competitors and even stoic in defeat, you don't compete for the fun of competing. You compete to win. Over time you will come to avoid contests where winning seems unlikely.

Action Items for This Theme

Select work environments in which you can measure your achievements. You might never be able to discover how good you can be without competing.

List the performance scores that can help you know where you stand every day. What scores should you pay attention to daily?

Identify an achieving person against whom you can measure your own achievement. If there is more than one, list all the people with whom you currently compete. Without measurement, how will you know if you won?

Take the time to celebrate your wins. In your world, there is no victory without celebration.

Seek competitive friends.

Try to turn ordinary tasks into competitive games. You will get more done this way.

When you win, take the time to investigate why you won. Counterintuitively, you can learn a great deal more from a victory than from a loss.

Be ready to:

Design some mental strategies that can help you deal with a loss. Armed with these strategies, you will be able to move on to the next challenge much more quickly.

Let people know that being competitive does not equate with putting other people down. Explain that you derive your satisfaction from pitting yourself against good, strong competitors and winning. It is not satisfying to outperform a "hobbled" player.

Many of us buy into the myth that talent and motivation are totally separate things. A strengths-based approach, however, debunks this. Simply put, your talents are your motivations; they're usually inseparable. A strengths expert explains.